While standing up and playing the electric guitar, the audio cable which connects the guitar to either the amplifier tends to get twisted up from walking back and forth and occasionally turning around. I would have to unplug the cord from either connected end and unwind it several times per hour during playing. A twisted up cord is greatly reduced in usable length and also tends to get easily caught up on other nearby objects like the floor effects boxes, microphone stands and whatever else may be in the way, instead of just laying flat and manageable as when it was first plugged in. People tend to turn around going in the same direction just as they will typically start into a staircase using the same lead foot of preference. Once the cord is twisted up, it must be unplugged from either the guitar end or the destination end and untwisted or else you would have to twirl around in a circle the opposite direction many, many times. Both of those solutions are undesirable for obvious reasons. I thought there must be a freely rotateable cord available for purchase, so I began searching the internet, musical instrument supply catalogs and my local music stores. I was unable to find anything at all like that for musical instruments and not even any mention of anything close in any discussions or articles on the internet. I've also never seen anything remotely close in any of several hundred music magazines that I've received over the last few decades.
Upon further searching for a solution to my problem, I came across a ball bearing action, rotating connector that uses mercury, a liquid conductive metal, to make the connections between the two moving contacts within the rotating connector. This connector is primarily aimed for industrial uses, as is suggested on their website. This particular rotating connector is made by Mercotac, of Carlsbad, Calif., model 205 series. By splitting a typical coaxial electric guitar cable and connecting the Mercotac 205 rotating connector inline with the length of the electric guitar cable, it would allow for quiet and free rotation of the cable while performing. The mercury provides noise-free, moving contact within the connector with virtually no mechanical resistance and extremely low electrical resistance, which is of great benefit to an audio signal passing through it.
Another benefit of this device is extended life of the cable since the twisting action subjected to regular cables eventually breaks down the internal copper wires and causing breakage and failure of the connection.
I have built a prototype which I use almost daily and it has worked flawlessly.
One existing alternate solution is use of a wireless device. These are commonly used by musicians worldwide. Another attempt at solving this problem is shown in prior art of U.S. Pat. No. 5,419,707, issued to Kelley for Swivel Electrical Connector. Other various older swivel connector patents such as prior art of U.S. Pat. No. 4,590,337, issued to Engelmore for Rotatable Electrical Connector for Coiled Telephone Cords also exists.
The shortcomings of the wireless devices are that they are costly, complicated and delicate. A receiver must be placed somewhere nearby with an audio cable leaving it, connecting it to where you would like your audio signal to end up. The receiver also requires power, usually in the form of an A/C power adapter and cord commonly called a “wall wart”. Then, you must wear a transmitter which is run by batteries that will only last a few hours. Typically, batteries are needing changing before each live performance since you never know how much life is left in the battery. Having a battery die in the middle of a performance would be very bad. The transmitter has a cord coming out of it which plugs into the instrument. Both the receiver and transmitter are sensitive, delicate devices prone to damage if mishandled. Also, many of these devices have volume adjustments, transmit and receive frequency selection and sometimes squelch controls which make them more complicated than cables and do not always deliver a clean and accurate audio signal.
The prior art, U.S. Pat. No. 5,419,707, issued to Kelley for Swivel Electrical Connector, does not appear to be available for sale, possibly, because of some of the following problems. Kelley's Swivel Connector would need to be attached at either the guitar/instrument end of a cable or the destination end, either an amplifier or an effects box on the floor or similar device, and not along the length of the cable where the twisting is occurring. At the guitar end of a typical cable, most all guitar player that I've ever seen will first pass the cable between the where their guitar strap contacts the butt end of the guitar. This strain reliefs the cable from being kicked out of the connector jack of the instrument, should they step on the cord which is hanging down near their feet. This strain reliefing of the cable would prevent Kelley's Swivel Electrical Connector from being able to release the twisting of the cable since the cable is being pinched between the guitar body and guitar strap, beyond his connector. Also, if the Kelley's Swivel Connector is instead placed at the destination end, the weight of several feet of cable laying on the floor before reaching its destination, would in most cases prevent it from freely rotating around and relieving the cable stress since the twisting energy is focused near the player where the cable is hanging from the instrument. Thus, my Rotatable Musical Instrument Cable is a rotating cable rather than a rotating connector on either end of a cable.
Another greater problem is that the prior art swivel connector uses electrically conductive mechanical wiper pads and contacts, similar to common slip ring connectors, to make the electrical connections. This would make for more physical resistance, more physical wear and tear internally, and also generate electrical noise as the contacts get dirty from the wearing action. Many musicians use high gain amplification that would make even the smallest of electrical noises very noticeable to the listener. Mechanical slip ring type connections will work fine for many industrial types of moving electrical connections, but would not be very useful to sensitive instrumentation devices or critical audio paths. The ball bearing action and mercury electrical connections within the Mercotac 205 part that I am using, as well as the rotating part of it being placed along the length of the cable near the user, make my Rotatable Musical Instrument Cable far superior to Kelley's Swivel Electrical Connector. My invention rotates easily and makes no noise at all even with extremely high gain amplification,
Prior art of U.S. Pat. No. 4,590,337, issued to Engelmore for Rotatable Electrical Connector for Coiled Telephone Cords, uses the slip ring contact and wiper method on the moving electrical connections and carries similar drawbacks as the aforementioned device by Kelley.
It is therefore an object of the invention to connect an electric guitar, bass or other musical instrument or audio device to another piece of musical or audio equipment.
It is another object of the invention to be able to rotate freely during use, so as not to twist up.
It is another object of the invention to be noiseless during its operation.
It is another object of the invention to have very low electrical resistance in the audio path.
It is another object of the invention to increase the life of the instrument cable by reducing the fatigue to the internal cable wires that is normally caused by the cable getting twisted up.